With many a winding turn
That leads us to who knows where
Who knows when
But I’m strong
Strong enough to carry him
He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother ~ from the song, “He Ain’t heavy, He’s My Brother” by Bobby Scott and Bob Russell
“…She’s my sister…” I am grateful this evening for my family. It’s a broken record and an oft repeated them in these blogs–family is mentioned in approximately 125 of the 945 posts. When I think of the most important, biggest blessing in my life it is the love and support of my two children and my five siblings and their partners and children. Second and related to this blessing is the gift I had in living with and being raised by two strong, loving parents who, though now physically gone from my life (nearly 20 years ago for my mother and only three for my father), still remain with me in my daily thoughts and ponderings.
I can (and have) picked up the phone to call one of my sisters with silly questions about a recipe or a reminiscence or a bit of trivia. My brother and I laugh about all kinds of crazy things and can still recite from memory whole passages from Bill Cosby comedy routines we used to listen to on vinyl records back in the day. It’s so funny that we introduced our children–his and mine in particular–to Bill Cosby many years ago when they were children and now they can recite some of those same passages.
It was my family to whom I turned during some of my traumatic experiences–my divorce many years ago, the loss of a job, a partner, a home not so long ago. They reached out and supported me, sometimes actively, sometimes more in the background, offering a network of love and care. After the challenges of a few years ago I moved to the same metropolitan area where all three of my sisters reside to start a new job and begin again. Coming here was healing for me and I have been able to slowly pull myself together and recover from the drama and its aftereffects. Oh, I still have my moments of struggle and occasional frustration, but being here with my sisters has reconnected me to them in wonderful ways.
Then there’s family of choice. I am grateful for my “sister” Pat, my best friend from college, and my “brother” Roland, whom I met in California a number of years ago. I am so grateful to have friends who are like family. I am fortunate to have a few deep friendships, but also grateful for the acquaintanceships that while not as close as what I have with Pat and Roland (and a few other folks), they are solid and comforting and present, mostly in the background but sometimes in the foreground. “Make new friends, but keep the old,” the old childhood song says, “One is silver and the other gold.”
I’m so very grateful for family and friends, good work colleagues and acquaintances, all of whom enrich my life in so many ways. And it might be that I express the same sentiments about their importance, but it is not to be helped. On the voluminous list of things for which I am grateful, these blessings of family and friends sits very near the top. I keep coming back to a quote that apparently doesn’t exist in the form I remember it. It says, “No man is poor who has friends.” Perhaps I made it up or it is a twin to the quote from the movie, “It’s a Wonderful Life,” that says, “Dear George, remember no man is a failure who has friends.” I am neither poor nor a failure because heaven knows I’m blessed with friends and family. And for that I must say that I am exceedingly grateful. And so it is.
